You want to travel from Berlin to Hamburg relatively cheaply. A carpooling app such as BlaBlaCar can put you in touch with someone driving from Berlin to Hamburg with room for you in their car (at a price). What sort of information would you want to see about the driver offering the ride to Hamburg? Would the driver like to know anything about you?

For an app such as BlaBlaCar to succeed it has to address the problem of trust, this issue is common to the sharing economy.

Why is there the problem of trust in the sharing economy? How is this related to the problem of asymmetric information? Which mechanisms are used to establish trust between parties transacting online? Share your answers to these questions in the discussion.

Task: Explain the problem of trust for the sharing economy and how it is related to the problem of asymmetric information. Which mechanisms are used to establish trust between parties transacting online?